Dancing on the Edge

Festival of Contemporary Dance

DOTE Blog

I love Dancing on the Edge. Back in the day when I was a dance artist, living and working in Edmonton, DOTE presented my work thus offering me an opportunity to showcase in a different city and to mingle amongst artists that I’d never met.

Fast forward a few years, and now as President of DOTE, I continue to love it, perhaps even more.

It’s 10 days of the most amazing dance, physical theatre, and live performance featuring every hybrid of multi-disciplinary physical work from the lower mainland, British Columbia, Canada and abroad.

Feeding my soul with some of the most cutting edge fascinating work as well as presenting some work that encourages heated drink-in-hand-discussion on the deck between Edges (“I hated that.” “Oh really, I loved it.”), it opens up a world of possibility where people can disagree, respect each other’s comments, and then go in and see the next show together.

Our intrepid leader, Donna Spencer, continues to program an excitingly diverse festival mixing seven mixed programs; two full shows – Oath Midnight Rain (Beijing Modern Dance Company) and No Fun (Helen Simard); four site specific works that are free or by donation, a youth engagement program led by Heather Lamoureux where people 16-24 build community while seeing shows and taking classes for free; two workshops/discussions: Dance Dialogue: Traditional Dance Meets Contemporary Dance with Natasha Bakht, Yvonne Ng, Olivia C. Davies and others and What is Dance Dramaturgy led by Donna Spencer; and Best of Dances on Screen, a screening of selected international, Canadian and local films from the Festival of Recorded Movement.

It’s a time to celebrate all that the dance arts’ community is in Canada, to greet old friends and meet new ones. And to see some kick-ass dance.

Here we are, day four of the festival and we have already been shown some amazing works. We’ve seen international, national, and local artists perform so hard they are leaving sweat marks on the stage in-between moments of comedic genius to make the audience laugh until they cry. We’ve seen incredible architectural costumes acting as extensions of the body, and we’ve been challenged to ask ourselves where the “body of the state” exists. With just over half of the festival to go, there are so many great performances and artists to catch.

Lost Object/ive – John Ottmann

Here’s a roundup of what’s happened so far:

EDGE One brought us three diverse pieces: Here on the Ground, a duet performed by Meghan Goodman and Julia Carr of Body Narratives Collective, choreographed by Sarah Chase; Radios, a solo co-created by Ame Henderson and Joshua Beamish, performed by Joshua; and Isaac y Diola, created and performed by German Jauregui and Antia Diaz from Belgium. Here on the Ground was a light hearted piece incorporating the performer’s personal stories of pregnancy, family, and dancing. Joshua Beamish performed with an enviable physical articulateness while the sounds of crackling radio stations echoed out of his jacket pockets. *No shows remaining

Isaac y Diola shifted the mood of the program as Jauregui and Diaz brought an indescribable gravity to their performance. Despite the conceptual base of this work, finding its intensity through repetition and duration, the interconnectivity of creation and destruction created a conflict in the performers body’s maintaining the audience’s attention. It was either the maturity of the performance Jaruegui and Diaz gave, or the expectedly exciting moment of Jauregui sawing off the front two legs of the chair he was standing on, that wrapped EDGE One on a high note.

THUS SPOKE invited audiences into an alternate world where actions, words, thoughts, and desires were amplified through the isolation of the stage. Co-created by choreographer Frederick Gravel and playwright Etienne Lepage, THUS SPOKE employed the talents of four performers (Frederic Lavallee, Marilyn Perreault, Anne Theriault, and Frederick Gravel) in what could be called assisted solos. In what felt like an assemblage of the desperate thoughts and treatises and musings of the writer, the physicalization of each monologue grew into a familiar lexicon of characters. The energy of these performers was incredible, electrifying, and all consuming as the lights that shone equally on the audience as the performers brought us into the show. *No shows remaining

EDGE OFF One included MascallDance’s The Outliner: en evening of solos in which solos created between 1984 to 2011 were included in the work. The solos were embellished and expanded by the use of magnificent architectural costumes that manipulated and were influenced by the movement and choreography. *No shows remaining

Douce tourmente – DORSALE danse Sylvie Desrosiers

Still to Come:

EDGE Two has its last performance tonight. Lost Object/ive performed by Meredith Kalaman, choreographed by Toronto’s John Ottman, considers the body as the anthropological and archeological artifact and site of knowledge. Kaleido, a work OURO Collective commissioned Montreal’s Tentacle Tribe to choreograph, plays with symmetry and the diverse skills of the performers with their hip-hop, whacking, b-boy, and vogueing backgrounds. The final piece is an excerpt of Dialogue, Wen Wei Dance’s latest work focusing on the honest connection of the five male performers. *Final performance: July 11 at 9pm; Tickets here

EDGE Three had their first performance last night. This program is bursting with local performers who always know how to entice, entertain, and challenge their audiences. the neck to fall is an ode to somatic pioneer Amelia Itcush that releases a lively dance inside the body performed by Ziyian Kwan of dumb instrument dance. I can’t remember the word for I can’t remember is Tara Cheyenne’s latest work-in-progress that seamlessly combines story-telling, character work, monologues of vulnerability and hilarity, along with movement and dance. *Final performance: July 12 at 9pm; Tickets here

EDGE OFF Two began last night including two works by local choreographers: Wags Alternate by Thoenn Glover, and the edges of things are ill defined by Julianne Chapple. *Final Performance: July 11 at 8:30pm; tickets here

EDGE Four starts tonight. It includes Open Fire choreographed by Olivia C. Davies, using the story and narration of Carmen Aquire; fighting chance, another solo performed by Joshua Beamish, choreographed by Noam Gagnon of Vision Impure; and Mettle, Out Innerspace’s latest work choreographed by Tiffany Tregarthen and David raymond in collaboration with performer, Elya Grant. *Performances: July 11 at 7pm & July 13 at 9pm; Tickets here

Upcoming in the festival is EDGE Five, EDGE Six, EDGE Seven, Douce Tourmente, and the two outdoor performances, En Route and Psuedotasuga – Earth to Sky. Be sure to look at the schedule to see times and to buy your tickets!

Have you been to any of the shows? Are you coming to any shows in the next few days? Comment below, or send us an email with what you saw and what you thought at info@dancingontheedge.ca (and don’t forget to tweet, facebook, and instagram – tell your friends)!

Dance is a vital part of the Vancouver arts community and Dancing on the Edge contributes greatly to that vitality – we hope you will continue to support the success and evolution of the EDGE!

This year we are delighted to introduce this program that exposes emerging dance artists in training programs to new works and connects them to the festival. Our first two ambassadors are Alejandra Miranda and Ileanna Cheladyn.
They have generously shared their reactions to the works they have experienced at the festival so far (see below).

ALEJANDRA MIRANDA-CABALLERO

“Dance for love” – Pina Bausch

Alejandra was born in La Paz – Bolivia, where she started studying ballet at the edge of 7. For some years, she stopped dancing until she meet Truddy Murillo and fell in love with dance, participating in the Mandala Dance School as a dance performer. The decision of becoming a professional dancer came at the edge of 19, while dancing with Truddy Murillo and Norma Quintana in Bolivia. In 2012 she went to the “Catedra de danza del Ballet Nacional de Cuba” to train ballet. The next year she started as an apprentice with Gaviota Dance Company and the Guayruru Project. The last three months of 2013 she went to train in Buenos Aires Argentina with Alfredo Gurquel, Alejandro Totto, Sergio Villalva, David Señoran, among others. She moved to Vancouver almost two years ago to continue her dance career. She just finished her first season with Lamondance and plans to join the program next year as well.

ILEANNA CHELADYN

It all began in Edmonton AB where Ileanna Cheladyn was born and began tormenting her parents and family with her voracious appetite for knowledge and constant inquisitions for information. Shifting from Ukrainian dance to contemporary dance in teen-hood, Ileanna found her calling and promptly moved to Montreal after graduating high school and attended Ecole de Danse Contemporaine de Montreal. Ileanna recently moved to Vancouver to continue her contemporary dance training with Modus Operandi. Through her dance training, Ileanna has supplemented her education with a fascination of English literature, photography, writing, and producing. Ileanna is an eccentric coffee consumer and a writer of all things good and evil. Presently and in the future, Ileanna would love to work for, dance for, and support her fellow contemporary dance artists while creating her own work to add to the evolving discourse on art and dance.

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EDGE 2 – DANCING ON THE EDGE Day 5

By Alejandra Miranda Caballero

Last night´s program was an amazing combination of artists. After a while I finally had a chance to watch a dance show and I was transported to an indescribable moment. To all the people who were part of the performance THANK YOU for giving such a warm sensation to my heart.

Meredith Kalaman in Femme Fatale, credit Curtis Stogell

Femme Fatales is a fantastic piece full of intense expressions while the three performers explored their inner feelings and femininity. Each one of them had a unique type of movement to express such a heavy topic. Kalaman´s choreography has diverse dynamics to rooted in the humanity of each of the performers. I just loved every moment of this piece.

Tracing Malong transported me to my own traditional roots, the dance of Tolentino was full of shapes and the exploration of this marvelous fabric. There was this image when he puts his head into the Malong and I felt so curious about the world he could be looking at. His body explored an ancient,t really grounded movement, so connected with more than the person who dances.

Just Words. The interaction of words, the voice speaking and these three characters on stage moving, brought one word to my head: certainty. The hard work, the moments of complete chaos (as described by Serge Bennathan in the piece) gave birth to love. No matter how tired and overwhelmed the artists gets the result of just moving forward in space, no matter the direction, will be the expression of the artist. The intensity of the performers, their precision and constant certainty amused my senses to a complete place of joy.

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EDGE UP + EDGE 1

By Ileanna Cheladyn

What is a dancer to do?

There are times when I am given the well-known look of discomfort when I profess to acquaintances my love of contemporary dance and my rigour of pursuing a contemporary dance career. In those moments I work harder. I train harder, think harder, and I watch harder. I just get worked up over the discomfort of when I’ve been given a disappointing comment in regards to my passion and entire life. Thankfully, Dancing on the Edge has come at a fortuitous time for me, where the heat is unbearable and I can dictate my own schedule; crawling into a dark air conditioned theatre is just as appealing as the beautiful bodies I see on the stage in every show.

Hurtling into the last half of the festival, Dancing on the Edge has presented some amazing works. My highlights thus far include Justine A. Chamber’s Family Dinner: The Lexicon, Vanessa Goodman’s Container, and NINEEIGHT by Hong Kong Exile’s Natalie Tin Yin Gan, Milton Lim, and Remy Siu.

Perhaps it’s only human of me to find slight difficulty in writing about the work of my contemporaries, but those three pieces stabbed me so viscerally in the theatre that my will to live has been refueled… how could I deny sharing that?

Family Dinner 2014 by Justine A. Chambers

Family Dinner: The Lexicon is a score derived from the dining and social gestures of guests from the research and development of Family Dinner (May 2013-February 2015). As the lights came up, the slew of comments I’ve heard about Family Dinner dripped into my mind: “Justine made a dinner, videotaped it, then made everyone re-learn the whole thing”, “It’s basically all the best dancers in the city eating”, “They’re a mirror into your own social, dining, and performance habits.” Initially I was intrigued by the assumptions that I grew from such comments, but I’m thankful that the comments that shaped my assumptions were curt and shallow. Nothing could have prepared me for what was to unfold (other than napkins… I knew those were bound to be unfolded).

Family Dinner – image by Justine A. Chambers & Lisa Gelley

So. I sat in the Firehall theatre and I was mesmerized by each meticulous motion mimicked by each performer and echoed throughout the piece. I saw the performance-faces of talented performers struggling to casually eat a dinner while remembering which way to flip the fork, shift the plate, tilt the head. I felt like I saw myself in the way Josh Martin chewed with his hand covering his mouth, or how Lisa Gelley politely utters “sorry” when crossing her leg. I especially saw myself when Aryo Khakpour spread his legs and leaned back with satisfaction. While I’m on a roll here: Kate Franklin’s swirling of wine and rolling of eyes was a tad too close to my reality to be comfortable with, and Alison Denham’s swift shovelling of pasta and salad into her face was reminiscent of all those dinners between dance classes.

Being so enthralled in something so… well… not “dancey” was a perfect reminder that everything is dance. While the institutions of dance presentation has formed the way audiences consume and enjoy dance, I yearn for the dance works that present the body, and its movements, without pretention and without need for validating one’s flexibility. If Family Dinner: The Lexicon gives any insight into the work or process of Justine Chambers, I would hazard a guess and say that while it may not be easy, the rigour required would be fruitful.

Now to casually and swiftly change subject: Vanessa Goodman. Peter Dickinson writes: “Container ends with Goodman dancing in a single, slowly fading spot upstage… her upper body raised to the ceiling as if she is about to be transported to another world, one that is big enough to contain her outsized talents.” Yes. Her “outsized talents.” For a petite, compact woman (she stands right below my chin), she is a lanky, sinew-y, and precise monster on the stage. Ones bones may dictate size, but holy, talent and energy abounds.

Vanessa Goodman, credit Jeff Pelletier

Watching Container I felt a foreign feeling in my viscera. I often watch professional dancers whom I respect, Goodman being one of them, but rarely do I feel an excitement in the future of dance, art, and the performer’s career. Goodman sparked this responsive exhilaration in me that posed a friendly challenge. Not a challenge to me specifically, but to the dance world at large: how can the ephemeral art form of dance burn in your mind and be a torch bearer for the universal human desire of progress and understanding? Her stretching limbs, smiling face, and pulsating spine created a score that developed through a cyclical momentum, showing the audience both the triumphs in the failures and the devastation in the laurels. I guess I would say that I feel the excitement a peer would have towards what Goodman creates next. Obviously she and I are of different generations, separated by a multitude of years and experiences, but her welcoming demeanour shone onto the Firehall audience and warmly invited us into her odyssey.

Okay. NINEEIGHT. Firstly, a public apology to my audience neighbours because I was full-out shaking in my seat, rocking to the beat, clenching all my sphincters, and expelling some audible respiratory reactions.

Utilizing recognizable gestures and the physicality present in Stephen Chow movies, the pop culture references in NINEEIGHT (acting as an immediate and effective tool for immersion) constructed a political and cultural landscape that was horrifyingly beautiful. Human existence and civilization’s history, as I have come to understand it, is plagued with torment – our current state of globalization is intensifying inequality and the hunger for power is nearly overwhelming. NINEEIGHT provided an image of Dionysian bliss full of beautiful media, and aural intrigue to satiate my short attention span (not to mention the powerful movers on the stage – Alex Tam, Milton Lim, and Michelle Lui – who were succinct interpreters on the stage). While my senses were being enlivened by the movement, audio, and visual media, a hint towards the reality of hidden insidious actions of over-ruling powers was brought to life. It was like the beautiful song of the siren. Natalie Tin Yin Gan provided the audience with laughter turned swiftly into discomfort when simple games turn into maniacal stabbings. Images were held an ideal length where I could see what was happening, absorb it, think about it, fill in the gaps, and start to be unnerved by what my mind came up with.

The piece finished, and I released the death grip I had on my own hands only to smash them against each other in futile effort to make a worthy clap. What seems like an unsurmountable task of combining medias in a cohesive manner, yet simultaneously communicating a history and an issue in current events with clarity and respect is what I hope to see more of… especially from Hong Kong Exile.

Now, when I cross the path of a piece of critical art, such as NINEEIGHT, or I get to experience things resembling something very close or very far from my mode of operation, such as Family Dinner: The Lexicon or Container, my attention is brought to the obstacles they mean to overcome. I see the conflicts (within their practice, their world, or our planet) they mean to define. I also begin to see the thoughts and ideas of those around me that are fighting any current manifestations and refuse for their work to be summed up by facile labels. The work presented thus far at Dancing on the Edge has provided hope that our contemporary culture is not using art for social regulation or as a means to a radical end. Dance in Vancouver (if Chambers, Goodman and Hong Kong Exile can serve as vibrant examples) is truly pushing us to an edge where we must build the path as expeditiously as we step forward. If dance rarely comes up as a subfield of “art”, then these works are not scratching out a definition for dance, but redefining what art is. Or they’re just amazing performances that are life-affirming and guide me in carving out a piece of existence; dance is great, and thankfully it can be found everywhere.

I’m looking forward to Edge 4, 5, and 6 which I’ll be checking out over the remaining days of the festival; hope to see you all there!

Introducing the Dance Passport, your guide to a dance adventure that takes you through to streets, parks & hidden places of Vancouver! Best of all, it’s free and if you explore enough dance frontiers, you’ll earn a free ticket!
See any of the six free/by donation, site-specific shows at the festival & collect stamps along the way.

SEE SHOWS & Get three stamps from each location and you’ll earn a free ticket! You can grab a Dance Passport and register at any venue to start collecting stamps.

Conditions: You must register with a festival volunteer at the first venue you visit. Passports with three stamps can ONLY be redeemed for a free ticket IN PERSON at the Firehall Arts Centre Box Office (280 East Cordova) and tickets are subject to availability. There is a limited of one passport per person, not transferable.

What: Notice is hereby given of the Dancing on the Edge Festival Society’s Annual General Meeting.

Where: Firehall Arts Centre (upstairs studio)

280 East Cordova Street, Vancouver, BC

When: Sunday January 18, brunch at 12 noon followed by the meeting at 12:30pm

Join us for the Dancing on the Edge Festival Society’s Annual General Meeting January 18 to recap the wonderful successes of this year’s festival (a 36% jump in attendance!) and look at what is in store for the festival’s 32nd year. And partake in some delicious brunch!

On today’s stages, there’s no shortage of thoughtful and creative works from talented dance artists and creators – original choreographies that pull you in through the sheer magnificence of the movements. With risk-takers all around us, it’s rare to find a work that truly goes against the grain; we often see inventive choreography, but it’s a rare thing to witness original movement, or moreover an unusual intention behind the movement.

The Body In Question, constituting of the two solo works At Once and News, is performed by Toronto Dance Theatre’s Christopher House and choreographed – or perhaps composed by iconic Choreographer Deborah Hay. This is one work that truly achieves the elusive status as unquestionably “original”. As seen at the Firehall Arts Centre last Tuesday evening as part of Dancing on the Edge, The Body In Question manages to be intelligent and communicative while at the same time, mesmerizing.

House first learned this work in Findhorn, Scotland in 2009 where he was a part of the Solo Performance Commissioning Project along with 19 other dancers. Here, House received personalized guidance from Hay on this work, along with strict directions to rehearse these solos everyday for three months without an audience once back on Canadian soil. The result is a masterpiece all his own.

With many hidden concepts alive in this work – among them the juxtaposition between joy and sorrow and the release of movement the moment it leaves the body – it is preferable to analyze this piece on a surface level as a reaction to what you see before you.

While two distinct solos, they both shared very similar characteristics. Executing the movement, House was very much ‘of the moment’, aware of each twist of the arm or flick of the foot as it was happening, as opposed to having a pre-determined intention before the fact. Indecipherable chanting and singing added a blissful dimension to an otherwise silent performance, and awareness from House for the audience and the environment led to some playful moments with the curtains, the stairway, and a squeaky spot on the floor he came across by chance.

Dress shoes added to an otherwise casual outfit in At Once, and a playful kilt in News added an additional layer of intrigue; perhaps the kilt was selected as a nod to the country in which he first learned this work, then again maybe it was an arbitrary selection in an attempt to keep us guessing.

With one more showing, The Body In Question is an original, captivating that dance devotees throughout the city certainly won’t want to miss.

Sat July 12, 3 – 5pm– Festivals & Dance
Join artists, audiences and presenters for a conversation about the role of dance festivals in the world of dance. Hosted by Brian Paterson, featuring Joyce Rosario from PuSh Festival, Mary Louise Albert from Chutzpah! Festival, Barbara Bourget and Jay Hirabayashi from Vancouver International Dance Festival, and a representative from the Dance Centre.

The Firehall Arts Centre is located at Cordova & Gore. All talkbacks will be in the studio upstairs.

Note, if you are seeing a show at the festival, the first performance of each show will feature a talkback (except Ottawa Dance Directive).

Christopher House will also be holding talkbacks after both his performances.

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A message from Andrea, President of DOTE
I love Dancing on the Edge. Back in the day when I was a dance artist, living and working in Edmonton, DOTE presented my work thus offering me an opportunity to showcase in a different city and to mingle amongst artists that I’d never met. Fast forward a few years, and now as President… Read more »

So far at DOTE 2016
Here we are, day four of the festival and we have already been shown some amazing works. We’ve seen international, national, and local artists perform so hard they are leaving sweat marks on the stage in-between moments of comedic genius to make the audience laugh until they cry. We’ve seen incredible architectural costumes acting as… Read more »

2016 Festival applications are now available
Applications for the 2016 Dancing on the Edge Festival are now available. The 28th annual Festival will run July 7 – 16th, 2016 in venues around Vancouver in traditional and non-traditional venues. Check out http://www.dancingontheedge.org/get-involved/2015-submissions/ for more information!